My auction buddy was talking about Coca Cola like it was a member of the family. Painting a picture in my mind of a memory that was so real that she could taste it.
About how she’d reach into one of those squat floor-model red coolers with the white Coca Cola logo on the side, fish around inside and pull out an ice-cold Coke in a bottle. She told me this after she and a couple other auction-goers had reminisced about their childhood Coke experiences.
It had been the same about a month before when a rusty old Coke cooler sat in the back yard of an auction house waiting to be sold. She wanted to take that one home.
I suppose all of us have our Coke memories, since the soft drink has been around forever – through our grandparents years and our parents years and then us and on to those who will come after us. The ubiquitous Coca Cola – its marketing is extraordinary – provides us not only with a product but with the experience of consuming it. Janet’s remembrances went way beyond the simple act of retrieving a bottled Coke.
I don’t have her cool memories of a refreshing Coke. The first memory that comes to my mind is that of the tall Coke machine that stood in the hallway near the principal’s office in my elementary school. It had a slot where we slid in our six cents (I believe that’s what it cost then) and a bottle dropped in the pocket below. Although we couldn’t see the route, we could hear the bottle’s “plop.”
Coke items – be they bottles, bottle cases, coolers, signs, bottle openers, trays, magazine ads – are as common at auctions as dishes and books. You can get them authentic and original, or as reproductions. They are probably one of the easiest items to collect because there seem to be so many of them. For that reason, you’re not likely to get rich off most of them but you could get lucky and find an item of value.
Recently, I found a miniature Coke bottle lighter among items in a box lot. It had a few small nicks, but overall it was in good condition. The lighters sell on eBay for an average of $20 to $25.
Janet’s memories were born in 1960s Brooklyn in a neighborhood of residents who mostly had relocated from the South. Around the corner from her house was Mr. Boone’s store, where she retrieved her 6-ounce Cokes from the cooler. Big jars of pickled pig’s feet and pickled eggs sat on the counter of the store, she recalled.
At the auction, Janet admired that rusty Coke machine from afar. “I’d like to have that,” she said, thinking that it would look good in her basement holding small bottles of the soft drink. I understood. I could also imagine having the machine in my home, but I wouldn’t, though. I stay away from most soft drinks.
The machine had attracted two other auction-goers. One man told of buying a cooler and using it as a planter. What a waste, I thought. That seemed a poor use of the machine. The other man may have been thinking the same thing. “It still has a compressor,” he said, looking it over, “and it still works.”
Janet didn’t bid on the cooler, but several people did. It sold for $90.
Do you have any Coke memories? I’d love to hear about them in a comment below.
Meanwhile, check out these other Coke items I’ve come across at auction:
